Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
READING CALIFORNIA
Crack open these classics from some of California's less likely literary locations:
Central Coast The Selected Poetry of Robinson Jeffers- In the looming, windswept
pines surrounding his Tor House, Jeffers found inspiration for staggeringly beautiful
poems.
Central Valley The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts(Maxine Hong
Kingston) - A chronicle of growing up Chinese American, reflecting the shattered mirror
of Californian identity.
Gold Country Roughing It(Mark Twain) - The master of sardonic observation tells of
earthquakes, silver booms and busts, and getting by for a month on a dime in the Wild
West.
Sierra Nevada Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems(Gary Snyder) - Influenced by Japan-
ese and Chinese spirituality and classical literature, a Beat poet captures the meditative
openness of wild landscapes.
Social Movers & Shakers
After the chaos of WWII, the Beat Generation brought about a provocative new style of
writing: short, sharp, spontaneous and alive. Based in San Francisco, the scene revolved
around Jack Kerouac ( On the Road ), Allen Ginsberg ( Howl ) and Lawrence Ferlinghetti,
the Beats' patron publisher who co-founded City Lights Bookstore. Poet-painter-play-
wright Kenneth Rexroth was instrumental in advancing the careers of several Bay Area
writers and artists of that era, and he shared an interest in Japanese culture with Buddhist
Gary Snyder, another Beat poet.
Few writers have nailed contemporary California culture as well as Joan Didion. She's
best known for her collection of literary nonfiction essays, Slouching Towards Bethlehem,
which take a caustic look at 1960s flower power. Tom Wolfe also put '60s San Francisco in
perspective with The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, which follows Ken Kesey's band of
Merry Pranksters and their LSD-laced 'magic bus' journey starting near Santa Cruz.
In the 1970s, Charles Bukowski's semiautobiographical novel Post Office captured
down-and-out downtown LA, while Richard Vasquez's Chicano took a dramatic look at
LA's Latino barrio. For a frothy taste of 1970s San Francisco, the serial-style Tales of the
City, by Armistead Maupin, collars the reader as the author follows the lives of several
colorful, fictional characters, gay and straight. Zooming ahead, the mid-1980s brought the
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